


Peacock

by Meredydd



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 20:45:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/626349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meredydd/pseuds/Meredydd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John was fine with everything being casual...until he wasn't.  And it was all Victor Trevor's fault.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Peacock

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sunsetinthewes](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=sunsetinthewes).



 

 

            John didn't like Victor Trevor.  He couldn't put his finger on just _why_ , but he knew that he had never wanted to throat-punch someone so hard in his life.  Well, maybe not his entire life.  But certainly not since that bloke in Islington who was stalking old ladies and tying them up to... Well.  John cleared his throat and re-focused his attention on the pair before him.  Sherlock was sprawled on the battered old sofa and Victor was perched rather primly on the edge of the guest chair, hands folded neatly on his knees, lips curved into a genuine, pleased smile at something Sherlock was saying.   _It's The Woman all over again_ , an annoying voice that sounded entirely too much like Irene whispered in his thoughts.   _Look at him.  He's preening like a peacock_!  John refused to look, but he knew that Sherlock, for all his affectations of nonchalance and Byronic boredom, was, indeed, showing off for Trevor _.  The way he showed off for you, John,_ not-Irene murmured.  _Look at him, stretching like a cat, eyes narrowed like that.  He's entirely focused on Victor.  You could do naked cartwheels and sing the American national anthem right now and he'd barely notice unless you knocked over his mold experiment._

            “And I've very much enjoyed reading your blogs about Sherlock's adventures, Doctor Watson.”

            John smiled politely, tucking his fingers under his knees to avoid strangling Victor Trevor then and there.  “Thank you.  I try.”  His demuring was not lost on Sherlock.  He found himself the subject of a very pointed, very narrow gaze for all of three seconds before Sherlock turned his attention back to Trevor.  _Like you're not even here_.

            John found himself making tea for the three of them, not out of politeness but because he needed to get out of the room.  They were talking about someone called Lemont, someone they both found 'quite droll' and who had, apparently, gone on to father ten children in five years.  John rolled his eyes—he could practically hear the _raaaaah_ coming out in Sherlock's accent, skewing all Sloaney.  John could practically  _feel_ his lower income, semi-detatched, own-brand, sale-rack youth creeping up on him.  _You're pot noodles, he's foie gras.  You're semi-skimmed, he's crème fraiche.  Bologna and proscuttio.  God, you need to eat something.  These metaphors are ridiculous_.   John snatched the kettle up as it began to whistle and doled the water out between three cups, unceremoniously plunking one tea bag down per cup _.   Mister Victor Trevor, late of Islington, currently residing just three bloody streets over with his divorce papers and lonely heart, can make do with P.G. Tips, thank you very much!_   John shook out a sleeve of biscuits onto the tray, plunked down the sugar and cream, and stalked back into the living room.  Sherlock was alone.  “He in the loo, then?”

            “Hm? Victor? No, he left.  He had to sign papers on his new Jag or something equally tedious.”  Sherlock was still sprawled on the sofa, still looking bored, but something about him had shifted.  John set the tray down on the coffee table and took up one of the cups.  “Nice of you to make tea for him, given how much you wanted to throttle him for the past half hour.”

            “I...” John sighed.  “Sorry.  Couldn't help myself.  Just...just forget it, alright?  Have your tea.  There's the chocolate digestives you like.  I'll finish this and I think I should run down to the shops before it gets much later and--”

            “John.”                                                                          

            John set his cup down and closed his eyes for just a moment, opening them to find Sherlock's gaze pinning him in place.  “Sherlock, we agreed, when we started this, that it was casual.  As-needed.  We...we're not in a relationship.  Not a romantic one.”  He held up a hand when Sherlock opened his mouth to speak. “No, don't say anything, Sherlock.  Just... just let me finish.  I can't help it.  I was—am—jealous.  When I found out that you had been with him... I knew you weren't the virgin Irene tried to paint you as, but I didn't know you'd been in a long term relationship with someone.  I thought, maybe, you just didn't do relationships, that what we have going on was just what would work and I was going to take it.  But knowing you and Victor were together for years?”  He sighed, shook his head.  “Green eyed monster reared it's ugly head.  It's not like watching suspects flirt with you, or you bat your eyes at the girl down at the shops to speed her along at the till.  All I could think about was how you had been with this bloke and here I am, your best friend, your...your lover...and you never even considered anything more than mutual wanks and the occasional blowie with me.”

            Sherlock raised a brow.  “Done?”

            “Yes,” John sighed, picking up his tea and draining it in two scalding gulps.  “Let me have it.  Lecture me, pontificate. Get it over with and we can just both delete my little rant.”  He wanted nothing more, in that moment, than to burst into flames or sink through the floor or both, anything to get out from under Sherlock's intense stare.  Not-Irene laughed in his ear. 

            “Victor and I met at uni when his dust mop of a dog bit my ankle.”

            “Ah, good, a meet-cute.  That makes it better.”

            “John.  I thought you were done.”

            “Sorry. Had one more left.”

            “Hmm.  His dog bit me, Victor helped me to the infirmary, and we ended up talking for a while.  We...had much in common.”  Sherlock finally looked away, shifted, tucking his knees up under his chin and pressing his fingers together so hard they turned pink and white.  “We both had rather problematic relationships with certain male relatives.  Me, with my Uncle Hrothgar, he with his father.”  He paused, his lips twisting into something ugly.  “I believe the term 'funny uncle' is used colloquially for such instances, but in my case, it was quite apt.”

            “Jesus...”

            “He had nothing to do with it. At any rate, Hrothgar died under mysterious circumstances when Mycroft came home early for Michaelmas break.  Seems the old man got hold of some bad prawns.”  One eloquent shoulder shrugged.  “And fell on a kitchen knife.  Twice.”  He looked up at John then, gauging his reaction and satisfied by what he saw.  “No one mourned the loss.  Victor, however... his father did not do him the courtesy of dying early.  That old man lived until Victor was in his last year at uni.  We...bonded...  We found ourselves drawn to one another, two lonely young men with dark secrets, confused by our sexuality, lost amongst the sheep at Cambridge.”  He unfolded his long limbs and moved down the sofa until he was within arm's reach of John.  “Victor seemed to draw the wrong sort of man.  His father's abuse marked him, he felt, and made him the target of boys and men who took what they wanted, couched it in romantic terms and fancy dinners, plied him with gifts, but didn't believe his refusals.”

            “So you became his boyfriend to protect him?”

            “Would that make you feel better?  No, we genuinely cared for one another the way two broken people can.  Like sought like and we clung to one another.  In the end, he was the one to break it off.  His father died in the course of one of my investigations—oh, not from anything I did or failed to do.  The old man had a dodgy ticker and couldn't handle the reality of the situation.  Cocked up his toes and left Victor on his own. Victor...broke.  He left me and said he had responsibilities, expectations... And a mad chemist with a penchant for a seven percent solution didn't fit any of those.” 

            John wasn't sure who moved first, but they were both sliding to the floor together, legs tangling as he pulled Sherlock closer, fingers curling to the dark mess of his lover's hair and inhaling the sweat-salt-lemon-mint tang of his skin.  “Fuck, Sherlock... did he come here because he wanted you again, wanted his safety net?”

            Sherlock's laugh was almost breathless.  “You're getting better.  That is very much the reason why he came, even if he didn't say as much out loud.  Wife's left him for another man, his job is in jeopardy because he's been unable to pay attention and has lost quite a bit of money for his clients...  He came back to the beginning and hoped he could start over.” 

            Sherlock's mouth was close to John's ear, his breath teasing and sending shocks of warm need down his neck, into his chest and belly and lower.  John shivered and tightened his fingers in Sherlock's hair.  “Sherlock, I can't help feeling envious.  I want...I want to be someone you want to be with.”

            “Daft git.  I  _am_ with you.”  He pressed several hot, damp, open-mouthed kisses to John's jaw, throat, moving down to the bit of his collarbone visible through the open neck of his shirt.  He was contorted in John's lap like a circus act, long lines curved to fit, nestling down, forcing John's legs apart to gain access to more throat and pulse and just there, that spot under John's ear. 

            John shuddered, biting down on a moan as Sherlock's teeth and tongue worked  that magic spot to drive him mad.  His cock was already throbbing and he felt a flicker of guilt, a bit of not-good for being so hard, so turned on, on the heels of Sherlock's admissions, but he couldn't stop himself from sliding his hands down Sherlock's back to cup his hips, his arse, to hold him close.  “No,” he finally gasped, twisting away when Sherlock would leave a love-bite, “I mean  _with_ you.  Romantically.  Christ, Sherlock,” he moaned, Sherlock's long fingers working open the buttons of his shirt, John's eyes drawn upwards as Sherlock shed the red silk garment and towered above him, pale marble and dusky shadows of hair and nipples.  “When did I get so gone?  I can't imagine not being with you...”

            “John. John, just shut up.”  Sherlock bent down again, shifting, straddling John's waist as they slid further down until John was on his back on the floor and Sherlock was above him.  They kissed until they had to break apart and pant, until they had to gasp and throw back their heads for more air and damn their lungs for it.  Sherlock shifted, reaching for John's shirt, and pressed just  _so_ , making them both moan, cocks hard and rubbing together through layers of denim and wool and silk and cotton.  John grasped Sherlock's thighs and arched, pressing and bucking and seeking and _there, there, there_ they both moaned when he found it.  It was frantic, hard, Sherlock's hands pressing into the floor so hard, they were both surprised there were no fingerprints burned into the wood later.  John dug his heels into the edge of the sofa, bracing and thrusting up, up, up, pressing against Sherlock's hard cock, wanting more but knowing that, to stop now, that would be insane.  Half-formed words that may have been names, pleas, or both and neither were swallowed into messy kisses with clacking teeth and warring tongues, John's fingers clasping hard to Sherlock's shoulders and pulling him down, their bodies seeking more, more, more.  Sherlock threw his head back and groaned a deep, wrenching, rattling imprecation to God and thrust once, hard, his body shaking as a damp heat spread through fabric.  John pushed up twice more, pressing hard and holding Sherlock against him as his own release twisted his spine up and made him see stars, made him press his lips hard to Sherlock's throat to hold in words that were threatening to spill as they finally, finally, fell back into a boneless, sticky, wet tangle on the living room floor.

            Sherlock was the first to move, rolling into his back and eyeing the mess on his trousers with a mixture of interest, pride and disgust.  “I was trying to say,” he finally sighed, voice thick and rough, “I feel the same way.”

            John laughed, breathless and suddenly exhausted.  “For how long?”

            “Since you shot the cabbie.”

            “Since..Sherlock! That was four years ago!”

            “Mmmm.  You're rather slow on the uptake.  I was waiting for you to snap to.  I thought, surely, you'd figure it out when I sucked you off in the back of the panda but no, took another year, twelve 'just friends who shag' handjobs and a visit from my ex boyfriend...” Sherlock trailed off into giggles.  “I should really thank him, shouldn't I?”

            “I'll be sure to send him a basket of muffins,” John snickered.  “What says 'thanks for helping us get our heads out of our arses and realize we want to be together'?”

            Sherlock looked thoughtful for a moment, then smiled.  “Bran, I believe.”

 

           


End file.
